Yesterday was the final day of National Poetry Writing Month 2019.

This year I followed two sets of prompts: napowrimo.net and POETRYisEVERYTHING. That’s right—I was writing two NaPoWriMo poems a day.

For the most part, I was successful. There was only one prompt I failed to come up with a poem for, and one day I combined the two prompts for a single poem; consequently, the final tally was 58 poems. That takes care of the quantity.

So, how did I do otherwise? I like Chris Jarmick’s assessment: Some excellent work. Some worthwhile failures. In fact, I’m setting aside worthwhile failures as a future book title.

My own assessment is mixed. I felt either boxed in or uninspired by many of the prompts; those poems suffered accordingly. To use a well-worn sports metaphor, my batting average was much lower this year. My Day 9 poem, where every line begins When I think about love, even makes me cringe a little. I think my Day 6 poem, about the word if, turned out the best. The rest fall somewhere in between.

Though I will continue to be posting new poems more or less daily in the meantime, I will be doing this again on a greatly condensed timetable very soon: the 2019 Poetry Marathon is coming up on June 22nd. Plenty of time for me to decide whether to stick with the half-marathon (12 poems in 12 hours) or go for the full marathon (24 poems in 24 hours) this time…

Thanks for following along.

(1 May 2019)

Wishes sometimes have consequences is available for ordering from your favorite local bookstore!

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